FIORIGLIO: No certainty when dealing in baseball prospects

A few weeks ago, Major League Baseball held its annual first-year player draft, with Stanford grad Mark Appel being selected first overall by the Houston Astros. As a 21-year-old, Appel could potentially top the Houston rotation at some point during the 2014 season. Heck, he might even get a cup of coffee with the ’Stros when rosters expand in September. Appel’s potential for rapid ascension is not the norm, however. Far from in it, in fact.

Only three picks later, the Minnesota Twins selected Kohl Stewart, an 18-year-old high school pitcher from Texas. Stewart, despite the sizable talent that made him a top five talent, will not sniff the majors for at least three years and probably closer to five, all the while honing his craft in the minors. And a lot can happen in that time.

According to scouts who double as sportswriters, like ESPN’s Keith Law and the folks at “Baseball America,” the pre-eminent prospecting organization in baseball, when drafting a player as young as Stewart or J.P. Crawford — an 18-year-old shortstop from California who the Phillies took with the 16th overall pick — it is as much about future projection as it is about current talent.

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A high school senior that can throw 96 mph can have teams drooling but scouts also have to look for whether or not the player has good mechanics, whether he is physically mature, and if that teenager has the mental makeup to handle failure.

Because of all that projection, along with random variables such as injuries, the overwhelming majority of baseball players drafted never make it to the major leagues and if they do, the majority of those players are never superstars.

In leagues such as the NBA or NFL, there is generally the expectation that a player who is a star when he is drafted will immediately enter the league and be a star. Andrew Luck and Robert Griffin III came into the NFL as college standouts and immediately became top-10 quarterbacks. The same can be said for someone like Blake Griffin or Kevin Durant in the NBA. Even accounting for noted busts like Ryan Leaf and Greg Oden, the success rate for the transition from the amateur to professional ranks is much higher in those leagues.

In the MLB, though, the wait time for even the most developed prospects to reach the majors is a year or two, and it is usually another few years to make any kind of impact. Because of that kind of development time, even the most seasoned scouts often get it wrong.

A decade ago, when “Baseball America” compiled their top 100 prospects list, Giants righty Jesse Foppert was rated as the number five prospect in all of baseball, or 13 spots ahead of perennial Cy Young candidate Adam Wainwright. First baseman Jason Stokes came in at 15, directly behind future MVPs Justin Morneau (14) and Miguel Cabrera (12).

Scouts and organizations do their best to compile information and make educated guesses but even with all the data available, bad things can still happen. Which is to say, even if the Phillies do become “sellers” at the trading deadline, which they absolutely should, the haul of prospects received for players such as Jonathan Papelbon, Cliff Lee, or Carlos Ruiz, could ultimately provide the Phillies with zero production in their career.

In fact, one need only look at the tumultuous travels of the aforementioned Lee for a perfect example of the uncertainty dealing in prospects. In 2009, Lee was fresh off of winning the 2008 American League Cy Young Award for the hapless Cleveland Indians, who were in the midst of the rebuilding and therefore had no use for an ace who would likely bolt as a free agent before the team was contending for a championship. The defending World Series champion Philadelphia Phillies, however, were in dire need of an ace to sure up their rotation. The Phillies also had one of the better farm systems in baseball.

In what seemed like a match made in heaven, the Phillies sent a group of prospects, including two young pitchers that were ranked among the top 100 prospects in all of baseball by “Baseball America,” along with a solid catcher and infielder, to the Indians for Lee. Four years later, one of those “stud” pitchers is out of baseball while the other is on the road back from Tommy John Surgery while the offensive players are wallowing in Triple-A.

The very next season, following the Phillies inexplicable trade of Lee to the Seattle Mariners, the Mariners, after getting off to a bad start en route to a bad season, flipped Lee to the Rangers for another group of prospects, including “Baseball America’s” 13th overall prospect. Again, Lee led his new team to the World Series and the prospects he was traded for continue to underwhelm.

Although history will not look back favorably, the trades of Lee by Cleveland and Seattle made sense. Both clubs had an in-demand commodity and needed to rebuild with young players. Bad results are not necessarily the result of bad process.

However, bad process will almost always yield bad results. The Phillies trade of Lee after the 2009 season was bad process that yielded bad results. Conversely, the Phillies mistakenly believing that their team is a contender this season and hanging on to their tradable commodities is most certainly bad process and will almost definitely yield bad results, both this year and beyond.

When dealing in prospects, a lot can happen and there are no certainties. But, you miss 100 percent of the shots you don’t take. And those shots that are left untaken could haunt a team for years, or even decades, to come.